Bill Maher tells Democrats: 'Stand your ground' on Obamacare and Jimmy Carter

Real Time host Bill Maher offered up a "New Rule" and some advice for Democrats worried about their electoral prospects: Own your ideas and borrow a phrase popular with conservatives to defend the Affordable Care Act.

"Stand your ground," Maher said. "When a Tea Partier says, 'Obamacare is a government takeover,' say, 'I wish -- because that would mean Medicare for all.'"

A survey conducted by the Kaiser Permanente health system, Maher said, revealed that most Americans favor expanding Medicare and Medicaid, as well as lifting insurance policy bans against pre-existing conditions, all things Democrats downplayed.

"No wonder the Republicans have such an easy time selling their argument about Obamacare -- which is basically, 'Hey, we tried it, it was a big failure,'" Maher said. "How about volleying that one back with, 'What? We're still signing people up for Christ's sakes, how can we even know if it's a failure? What we do know is that Sarah Palin and Rick Santorum think it will kill their children. No, you guys are thinking of assault rifles.'"

Maher also came to the defense of former President Jimmy Carter, accusing Democrats of being the "real wimps" for going along with the notion that Carter had "a failed presidency."

"Failed by whose standards?" he demanded. "We may not have had a great economy in the '70s, but I'll tell you something else we didn't have -- a war."

But instead, President Barack Obama cites Ronald Reagan as an example of an inspirational administration.

"Obama's supposed to be an environmentalist -- he should be inspired by the president who put solar panels on the White House roof," Maher said. "Not the president who came after him and tore them down because he thought the Sun was interfering with Nancy's astrology."

Watch Maher's commentary, as posted online on Friday, below.